Truck Campers- Stepping Beyond Weight Basics
Now the subtleties begin. You may weigh your truck as described above, but in the glove box you find a sticker from the manufacturer that says the limit for a slide in camper is only 1850 lbs, so what gives? Why did weighing the camper determine that you should be able to carry a 2600 lb camper? The glove box sticker is usually assuming that your truck has all seats filled with 150 lb adults. If you were alone when you had the truck weighed (and you weigh 150 lbs) the math would work out perfectly. You at 150lbs + gas = 2600, and 2600-(150 x 5 empty seats)= 1850 lbs. Clearly, who will be the passengers in your specific case will vary. Few people drive with all truck seats filled, so he glove box sticker is usually conservative by at least 300 lbs, that’s why going to a truck scale is important.

If you look at the signatures of the owners of campers in the Truck Camper Topics and you will see that least 80% of the truck & campers are not meet the GVWR of their trucks. Is this safe? 80% of drivers drive faster than the posted speed limit. This doesn’t mean driving fast is safe, it’s a measured risk, and the example of successfully overloaded trucks does not mean overloading is safe. What you should take note of is that of the overweight trucks, if you unloaded all of the campers to the basic model and then weighed the truck, you would probably be just within the GVWR. From my truck example above, if you decided to buy a camper that would ultimately put your truck over its GVWR loaded up, by the example of others, find a truck camper that lists its basic dry weight of 2600 lbs or less.

Having your truck weighed is important. Without weighing it with the camper on, I would have driven for who knows how many miles on tires and rims that were not rated for the 6640 lbs on them. Would this have made a failure immenent, maybe not, but I have hit a few hard bumps that I wonder if I would have had a blow-out. I may not be under the tire specs by much, but under will always be better than over.

Quote:If you look at the signatures of the owners of campers in the Truck Camper Topics and you will see that least 80% of the truck & campers are not meet the GVWR of their trucks.

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Was this percentile derived from statistics?

Quote:80% of drivers drive faster than the posted speed limit.

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Same question as the one above.

Quote: From my truck example above, if you decided to buy a camper that would ultimately put your truck over its GVWR loaded up, by the example of others, find a truck camper that lists its basic dry weight of 2600 lbs or less.

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My Lance 820 lists a dry weight of 2585 lbs.
My Truck's GVWR is 9700 lbs.
My Total on the road weight is 10490 lbs.
As you can see I'm under your camper dry weight suggestion. However, I'm way over my truck's GVWR. I've made some mods to my truck to better handle this problem and my rear axle weight rating from the manufacturer (not Ford) is more than capable of carrying this load.
Having said all this, my real question is where are these over GVWR topics going? The bottom line is you are either over or under the vehicle's GVWR. If you are over, you have to make some choices. If you are under, you're home free.

I'm driving with a camper whose listed dry weight is 2200 lbs, but as I have it decked out, it is 2700 lb dry weight. The camper weighs 3000 lbs wet and 3400 lbs loaded to go camping. This example shows a 1200 lb difference between the dry weight of the camper in the manufacturers brochure vs the situation going down the road.

[quote][quote]If you look at the signatures of the owners of campers in the Truck Camper Topics and you will see that least 80% of the truck & campers are not meet the GVWR of their trucks.[quote]
1. Was this percentile derived from statistics?
[quote]80% of drivers drive faster than the posted speed limit.[quote]
2. Same question as the one above.
[quote] 3. The bottom line is you are either over or under the vehicle's GVWR.
4. If you are over, you have to make some choices. If you are under, you're home free.[/quote]
1&2 These are intuitively obvious therefore they cannot be proved.
3. Keen observation with wisdom beyond the simple words might imply to the casual observer.
4. If by home free, you mean the truck is specified by the manufacturer to handle this weight, then I agree. There are a lot of shades of gray here. A truck within its specified weight may still have handling problems and certainly may need some enhancements, driving caution, or both. A truck that is over could be a little or a lot over and the owner should take appropriate measures. Knowing where you are and what you are doing about it is a big item here. And even rigs within their manufacturers specs aren't sports cars.